about
Frequently asked questions
Fringe, generally
Q. What is Fringe?
Minnesota Fringe is a Minneapolis-based nonprofit organization whose mission is to connect adventurous artists with adventurous audiences. Our biggest program is the Minnesota Fringe Festival, an annual eleven-day performing arts extravaganza.
Q. When is Fringe?
In 2009, Minnesota Fringe runs Thursday, July 30 through Sunday, August 9. Give or take, Fringe takes place in early August (sometimes we get pushed up into July, though). Next year's Minnesota Fringe will take place Thursday, August 5 through Sunday, August 15, 2010.
Q. Where is Fringe?
In the Uptown, downtown, West Bank and Northeast districts of Minneapolis and in St. Paul. In 2009 there are 22 locations: 14 standard venues and another eight Bring Your Own Venues around the Twin Cities.
Q. How long has Minnesota Fringe been around?
Since 1993. We're celebrating our sixteenth anniversary this year.
Q. How do I volunteer to help with the Fringe?
Volunteers are our lifeblood. You can get more information on specific volunteer positions or sign up online.
Q. How do I find out more about the Fringe?
If your question has not been answered here, please send us an email and we will answer your question to the best of our ability. Or give us a call at (612) 872-1212.
The artists
Q. How do artists apply to Fringe?
When artists apply to the festival, they're simply declaring an interest in producing a show in the festival. No one reviews or selects scripts or performing companies. Instead, we determine the festival's lineup by lottery. If an application is selected in the lottery, the show has a guaranteed slot in the festival. If an application doesn't get a guaranteed slot, it's placed on a waiting list. Each year, a small number of productions in the festival drop out; as they do, we replace them with applications on the waiting list. In 2009, there was a nonrefundable $25 fee for each application.
In 2009, there were about twice as many applications as there were positions available in the festival.
Q. When are applications available? When's the lottery?
Applications are available in November and are due to our office at the end of January. The public lottery is held in February.
Q. Why a lottery?
Minnesota Fringe operated on a first-come–first-served system until 2004. On the first day we accepted applications that year, we received more
applications than we had performance slots—thus creating a big problem about how to determine who was "first-come" in the "first-come-first-served." To prevent a crush of applications on one day, we adopted the lottery system in 2005. It's much more manageable.
Q. How much does it cost artists to be in the Fringe?
There's a $25 nonrefundable application fee and, if an application is drawn to be in the festival, a base producing fee is $400. Minnesota Fringe has a graduated fee, so companies who request and receive larger venues or more access to technical equipment (such as video projectors) pay more than artists who request smaller venues and less tech.
The application fee covers venue rent for five shows, tech and box office staff, a listing in the printed program, information on the Web site and 65-70 percent of the box office receipts. Anything beyond the application fee that our participating artists spend is up to them.
Q. Are artists guaranteed anything?
Artists are guaranteed 65 percent of their box office sales. Although we promote the festival and provide our artists with as much guidance as we can, it's up to individual artists and companies to make their shows a success.
The festival
Q. How are venues assigned?
Every participating producer is asked about the sort of space their show requires (stage
size, seating capacity, audio-visual capabilities, etc.). We assigned venues based on what best fits what the
producer requested. Since space is limited, we can't always give a
best-case scenario to our producers-though that doesn't stop us from
trying.
Q. How are shows scheduled?
Attendance data from previous years is crunched to create a picture of how well (or poorly) attended each show time is. The show times for the 11-day festival are then divided into five strata from best to worst. Without exception, each
show is assigned one time slot in each category. This insures every show has an balanced schedule; no one has a perfect schedule, but no one has a terrible schedule. We also try to fulfill any special scheduling requests producers may have—as long as every show has one time slot in each category.
Because staff neutrality is important to Fringe, the festival is scheduled anonymously: Every show is assigned a unique numerical ID and we don't know who those numbers belong to until the schedule is completed.
Q. How much are tickets?
Read up on all of this year's ticket prices and box office policies.
Q. How were previous years' festivals?
Download the 2008 annual report and the 2007 annual report (PDF) to find out.
© 2009 Minnesota Fringe Festival. All rights reserved.
